‘Is he bothering you, Isabella?’ This time Jack didn’t meet his eyes.
‘He’s my friend.’ Bella sounded lackadaisical, but Jack sensed her body tense.
‘You’re so democratic in your relationships.’ Watson spoke as if he genuinely cared. His hands were like white fish; his nails were clean and trimmed. Jack knew that if he reached out and brushed the man’s skin it would be as cold and unyielding as the marble bust of Joseph Hooker. This man worked with plants. He was used to cutting and splicing, to rendering the whole into parts. He knew what was beneath the skin. He gave names to dead material. He gave plants existence.
‘How is the plate coming on?’ he enquired smoothly.
‘I’ve added in the fruit as you asked. But since you didn’t tell me until I’d nearly finished the plate, I’ve had issues fitting the fruit into the layout.’
‘If it’s too much for you, I can ask one of the others.’ So kind, so thoughtful. Jack saw the muscle above Bella’s cheekbone flick.
‘It’s not too much.’
‘Please could I see what you’ve done so far?’ He did a washing motion with his hands in happy anticipation. Jack kept still.
Watson’s request was a preamble to something he had planned. From the set of her shoulders Bella guessed this too. Jack was helpless; if he interfered it would have repercussions for her.
Bella lifted a sheet of paper off the easel and laid it on the table behind her stool. Jack looked at the most beautifully executed drawing. Better even than the one of the Eucalyptus gunnii from Tina’s bag that Watson himself had done. The lamp-black ink lines were sharp against the cream vellum; different thicknesses in the lines showed dimension. Jack knew from his hours of reading that the intention of a botanical illustration was not to make the plant look ‘real’, but to aid the work of identification for the botanist. Precise and uncluttered, the drawing displayed the elements of the specimen in logical flow. The leaves had been positioned to show the way they grew on the stem, the patina of the bark was depicted with uneven lines and stippling.
In the centre of the plate was a pencil sketch, but it wasn’t, Jack fretted, ready for inspection. The True Host’s late addition had given Bella a tricky puzzle because the only space on the plate was too small. One side of the fruit was hard by the length of bark that framed one side of the plate and balanced the stem depicting leaves that reached across the top of the drawing.
However, the objective was about science, not art, and Jack felt triumph for Bella, because for the purposes of a botanist, she had solved the issue. This was short-lived: True Hosts didn’t like to be thwarted; their objective was neither science nor art, but death.
He tried to catch Bella’s eye and let her know he was there for her. But she was looking at the drawing.
‘It’s going to be the wrong scale,’ Watson said at last.
‘It will be the same scale.’ Bella was still holding the scalpel.
‘This isn’t what I envisaged.’
Jack saw the dynamic. At one time most botanists were artists: a necessary skill because out in the field it was the only way to capture the plant. Joseph Hooker, a fine illustrator, had been self-taught. On a scientific voyage in his twenties he had filled notebooks with drawings done exactly as he required. It seemed that Watson wasn’t an artist, but as the botanist, he was the boss and Bella must do his bidding.
‘Do you know, I wonder if it would be preferable to do it again? A fresh start.’ The words of Stella’s company strapline. Jack shuddered.
‘If that’s what you want,’ Bella replied, apparently unruffled.
‘It’s not about what I want. It’s what works. We’re both of us servants.’ He lifted the plate up. It was centimetres from Jack’s face. Watson seemed to have forgotten that he was there. But he would be only too aware. Seconds later Jack was proved right,
‘What is the opinion of our esteemed botanist?’ He was looking at the plate, head cocked to one side as if considering a decision, but he was addressing Jack.
Jack thought fast. Watson’s decision was already made, so anything he said would make it worse. True Hosts despised flatterers and didn’t suffer contradiction or obstacles. They toyed with their victims. Watson had Jack in his sights. He had been in the sixth car that night when Jennifer Day died. He knew that Jack drove the Dead Late shift on the District line. Watson had only to bide his time.
Showing the right amount of deference, appealing to the man’s professionalism, often an Achilles heel, Jack chose his words carefully. ‘It is whether this drawing helps you identify the plant. If it doesn’t, then it would be advisable to redraw it.’ He avoided looking at Bella.
‘I will accept it.’ Watson handed the plate to Bella.
Bella waited until she heard the door to the Artists’ Room close behind Watson. ‘Thanks, Jack!’ She sounded heartfelt.
‘I didn’t do anything.’
‘You saved me a load of work. As it is I’ll make nothing on this job, he’s asked for so many revisions. He gives crap briefs, and then changes his mind halfway through. Shaves off my margins.’
‘You’re paid by the drawing?’ Jack was taken aback. ‘Aren’t you on a salary?’
‘Yes, to the first question. The budget is tight. I’m “lucky” because, though you’d never know it, he likes my work, so chooses me over the other artists. I get steady work.’ She gesticulated across the room to an empty chair in the other corner. ‘My colleague there scratches in the dirt. Shame because he’s good, been at it for decades. Mr Fusspants treats him far worse than me. He once made him scrap a plate because they found another specimen in Melbourne and didn’t need it. It’s because he knows he’s dealing with a frustrated botanist – he enjoys torturing him. Demeaning him.’
‘That’s fair enough, I suppose.’ Jack was loath to defend the botanist. ‘I mean about finding the plant already existed.’
‘Except he knew it all along.’
‘Would he waste resources deliberately?’ Stupid question. True Hosts were sadists and every act was a rehearsal of murder.
‘Who knows? We have to accept it. No such thing as a kill-fee.’ Bella jumped off the stool and grabbed Jack’s hand. ‘I’ll treat you to tea in the canteen!’
*
Jack was surprised to find the bright airy room on the top floor of the Herbarium, with windows on two sides, teeming with staff so early in the morning. Did scientists ever sleep?
‘Have this mug. The man it belonged to is dead,’ Bella said cheerfully, thrusting a mug decorated with a picture of Kenny from South Park – not botanical – into his hand. ‘We have our own mugs – a taxonomy of china, if you like! We used to have our own seats; woe betide you if you sat in the Succulent Corner if you were Palms.’ Bella was matter-of-fact. ‘Artists were nobodies, we had to balance on the door knob. Things have improved. Tea or coffee?’
‘Would it be possible to have hot milk?’
If Bella thought this request odd, she gave no sign. She took the mug off him, filled it with milk from a carton on the counter and set the microwave going.
‘If Chrissie told me now about that murder in the Marianne North Gallery in the seventies, I’d believe her like a shot. I pity the police trying to find the killer of the bloke your friend found there. Murder is the natural end game for thwarted ambition and hubris. It’s only a wonder that it doesn’t happen here more often.’ Bella hooted with laughter.
She gave Jack his milk and they found seats facing the terrace. It was now properly light, but heavy cloud shrouded the view of the Thames, giving everything a monochrome aspect.
‘You mentioned at the funeral that you had seen Tina recently. How come?’ He tried to sound casual. Bella was capable of saying it wasn’t his business.
‘That woman opposite is an expert on angiosperms. Legumes to be precise. That’s beans to you and me. She’s retiring next week and she’ll take her knowledge with her.’ Bella settled back in her seat. ‘Sorry, what did you say?’
/> ‘I wondering how come you saw Tina, given that you’d been out of contact. I no longer see any of my school friends.’ This was true.
‘She got in touch with me. Out of the blue. And there was Emily. She hadn’t mentioned she was asking her and she hadn’t told Emily that she was asking me. Control shit – typical of her. I said we shouldn’t go because the last time we agreed to meet when we were kids she never turned up.’
‘So you were still in touch with Emily?’ This struck him as unlikely.
‘Yes. We have nothing in common except shit childhoods, but that is enough. We go for walks, cinema and a meal at least once a month.’
‘Why did Tina want to see you?’ Jack couldn’t refer to the sharp, no-messing woman that he had met as ‘Chrissie’.
‘She told us she had cancer, but she would beat it. She said that if she atoned for her wrongs, gave something back, that would save her. Poor thing was desperate, I suppose. All the same, if I get a terminal illness, I’ll fight tooth and nail just like her. Emily’s more “so be it”. Touch wood, I’m fit as a flea.’ She patted the coffee table, making the tea slop over her cup.
‘Did Tina say what she had to atone for?’ This wasn’t the answer Jack had expected – he didn’t have the lawyer down as superstitious.
‘She said something about being sorry for running off one time when we were kids. Hardly a sin! She said she ended up in the North Gallery. We now think that was when she saw the murder Emily told us about at Chrissie’s funeral. She had been hiding in a cupboard in the gallery and saw some character in a book. I thought at the time that she was probably in shock, but Chrissie was too level-headed for that: the diagnosis spurred her to action.’ Bella took a Bourbon Cream from a plate on the table and bit into it.
‘What was the character?’
‘The cat from The Cat in the Hat.’ Bella hooted again, then became serious. ‘When we were at school she told us that it was her favourite book. I didn’t believe her. Now I think that at least wasn’t a lie. Poor Chrissie, what a bitch I was!’
Jack found himself feeling sorry for the little Christina Banks. Bella wouldn’t have changed over the years; she would have been as implacable then as she was now. Yet he’d found that he liked her.
‘She admitted that she’d stolen this love charm off the Watsons. It had a picture inside that she said was her mum and dad. I was jealous. I had no pictures of my parents kissing. My dad tried to pretend his affair with Mum never happened. Such a picture would have been high on the yuck scale, but it did make Chrissie’s parents seem glamorous. And it was incontrovertible truth. Emily was convinced. I wasn’t because Chrissie was like me, I too lied about my home life.’
Jack had several photos of his mum and dad kissing on their wedding day. He couldn’t remember seeing them kiss in real life. Hurriedly, he blocked the idea and tuned back to Bella.
‘...I tried to make up for it with Chrissie’s birthday card. But she never turned up.’
‘Did you worry that something had happened to her?’ Jack asked.
‘We presumed she had forgotten. I wonder now if she bottled out. I would if I was her. Shame – it was a rather good drawing!’ She squeezed Jack’s knee. ‘You can see I’m the modest sort!’
*
Jack retrieved his cart from the Artists’ Room. He would be late reporting in to the Estates Office although he had completed the job within the allotted time. In the corridor, he turned back to Bella, standing by the Artists’ Room door. ‘Take care, Bella. Watch your step with George Watson.’
‘Blimey, Jack, I can handle George. He’s a sweetie-pops!’ Another Lucie May laugh.
Jack couldn’t explain without telling her everything, that a ‘sweetie-pops’ was far from what Watson was. Nor could he explain about True Hosts. He repeated lamely, ‘Just take care.’
‘Honestly, George is harmless.’ Bella closed the door.
Chapter Forty-Seven
November 2014
Stella took some time to understand how the slim red-backed volumes were set out. At first she had assumed she had the wrong book, but there were no others. A typical frustration for a detective was a missing or misfiled record. She had been looking in the wrong ‘ward’. She found Priory Road. To her dismay the names of occupants registered to vote were listed by house number, sometimes with as many as eight in one dwelling. She didn’t know the number of Kew Villa. Then the words ‘Kew Villa’ leapt off the page. She was in business.
Stella had come to Richmond Library intending to establish who had lived in the large house by the pond when Terry had staked it out in 2010, and who was there in the seventies when Lucie May believed Terry had been lied to by a girl of a similar age to herself. A detective, Terry used to say, was like an electrician: Isolate the issue by testing all other scenarios one by one. It was a dictum that Stella followed when cleaning, stain by stain.
There were only two names registered at Kew Villa in 2010. Given the size of the house, eight occupants would have been a breeze. George and Rosamond Watson. Stella noted the names in her Filofax. His name struck a chord. She didn’t dwell on this. Terry had stressed it was important to avoid being bogged down with hints and hunches.
Everything rises to the surface in time.
She drew a grid with ‘Year’ running horizontally and ‘Name’ at the side. Starting with the present, she listed the residents, trawling back through the decades, volume by volume.
Forty minutes later she reached 1976. George and Rosamond Watson had been there continuously to 2013, the publication date of the last electoral roll.
If the Watsons had had children they had either moved away before they were old enough to register to vote or hadn’t registered. She shouldn’t rule out children; after all, her name wouldn’t appear with Terry’s under Rose Gardens North. His would be the only name listed, giving the impression that he had no children, when he had been a father of two. She recalled his advice: Set a framework of investigation and widen the boundaries only if necessary. Keep the task manageable.
Flicking back in her notes she found why the name was familiar. A George Watson had signed the drawing in the Boots bag that Tina had given her. The Watsons had lived there for over forty years.
Riddled with unknowns and assumptions, the task was barely manageable. Terry may – or may not – have made an inquiry at Kew Villa in 1976. The crime – if there even had been a crime – could have been any time before. Like a headstone, the electoral roll offered the bones of a story. Despite Terry’s advice, Stella ventured further back in time. In 1962 one James Hailes appeared alongside the Watsons. He was still there in 1958 which she decided was her end point. In 1961 George Watson disappeared and Rosamond Hailes replaced Rosamond Watson. Another name joined them in 1962. Harold Hailes. Since she was going back in time Stella had to stop and take stock of the permutations. She entered them on her grid. First assumption: the house had belonged to Harold Hailes. The second was that James and Rosamond were his son and daughter. Third, Rosamond married George and became Rosamond Watson. In 1962 Harold left the house, perhaps he had died. Perhaps the Watsons had bought James Hailes’s share. He too had left. She had no evidence for this, just a dance of names in small print in fusty-smelling books. She would go with the scenario until she came up with evidence to the contrary. This was thinking as Terry had taught her. Stella glanced up almost expecting him to be there.
She left the library and took the District line to Hammersmith station.
The Hammersmith Archives were housed in the central library on Shepherd’s Bush Road opposite the police station where Terry Darnell had spent much of his working life. As a girl, Stella had sat in the lobby of the station waiting for him, her lips working silently as she read the names of fallen officers carved in plaques above reception. She had clutched a pen and paper given to her by an officer at the desk, obediently following the instruction, ‘Do Daddy a picture.’ She had spent more time there than with Terry.
Stella found herself
a seat at a long table in the centre of the archives, a hushed room with stained-glass windows at each end.
She spread out Jack’s newspaper cuttings before her. She had supposed that he had got them from Lucie but, as she looked at them again, realized that he hadn’t actually said so. They had agreed she would start by finding out which house in Rose Gardens fitted the location of the hole in the Great West Road in which the murdered man had been found in June 1976. She referred to this incident in her Filofax as Case Two. It would be easy to confuse her research with the Kew Villa Case – Case One.
The archivist brought her the only Ordnance Survey maps on file for that period: five large sheets spanning 1955 to 1957. The last map showed the area when the six-lane carriageway had been completed. Usefully, while the other maps were paper, this map was transposed on to plastic film. By laying it over the map for 1956, Stella had a double image that showed which houses had been demolished and where they had been located. She snapped this with her camera app. As Jack had said, Terry’s street used to continue around a corner with twenty houses either side. This was no surprise to her: the end house of the existing cul-de-sac had a sheer wall as if smoothed with a palette knife. But she had imagined that Rose Gardens, like the adjacent Black Lion Lane, had run down to the river. Instead it had been L-shaped.
Stella lived at thirty-one. All the numbers in her cul-de-sac were odd with thirty-three on one end and twenty-seven at the other. Numbers 23 and 25 had been knocked down. In the 1950s, around the corner on the nearside of the street, the houses had numbered twenty-one to one. All now demolished. The crater in the Great West Road had appeared in the eastbound left lane where the houses had stood.
Stella examined a photograph of the hole that Lucie had given Jack. In the distance, she made out houses on the south side of the Great West Road. According to her map, they were the even numbers in Rose Gardens. She had a client at number 22 Rose Gardens: now a beleaguered terrace with traffic streaming by just feet from the front doors.
The House With No Rooms Page 28